4.30.2011

My Photographic Education: Garry Winogrand & Wolfgang Tillmans

I've always had a great interest in the medium of the photograph but I'm still much of a novice when it comes to my knowledge about the major players in the field. I'm in the process of better educating myself in this realm and one of the ways I aimed to do so was by visiting the Baltimore Museum of Art with my good friend Sarah last weekend. The BMA currently has a photography exhibit entitled Seeing Now on exhibit featuring work from over 60 photographers and a total of over 200 photographs taken since the 1960's - and better yet, it is entirely free of charge! 

I have a special fondness for photography with a sociological and/or feminist context - I guess it's rooted in my undergraduate education. Needless to say, one of the artists whose work most stuck with me from this show was Garry Winogrand. The BMA included a series of shots he had taken that were from a larger collection featured in his photo book Women are Beautiful (published in 1975). The photos are all snapshot-style images of women engaged in a variety of public activities, but there's something about the photographer and the time that makes them extremely compelling and gripping. 







I encourage anyone in the Baltimore area to check out Seeing Now which will be up until May 15th and of course, anyone in or around Chicago should definitely stop by the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Museum of Contemporary Photography (another awesome stop I made on a Chicago road trip years ago). 

Though this post doesn't cover the full extent of my familiarity with notable photographers, does anyone have recommendations of artists I should check out? Who are some of your favorite photographic artists?

Along with Garry Winogrand, I'm a huge fan of Wolfgang Tillmans. Years ago when I went on a family vacation to Chicago, we visited the Museum of Contemporary Art in the windy city. At the time they were having an exhibit featuring photographer Wolfgang Tillmans' work, and I fell in love with this particular photo entitled "Lutz, Alex, Suzanne & Christoph on beach ." It's stuck with me for years and is among my all-time favorite photographs. 

4 comments:

  1. thank you for your comment on my food blog. My friend who made that recipe is about to launch her website in English and it'll contain more than 500 healthy recipes ;-)

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  2. if you are interested in sociological/feminist work check out cindy sherman. and richard avedon's in the american west series is SUPERB! i did a post on it here: http://kristinebazan.blogspot.com/2010/11/richard-avedon-in-american-west.html also: barbara kruger, diane arbus, and lewis hine are all great. i've also posed about them as well. i'm very much interested in this genre of photography too. :]

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  3. Thanks for the recommendations Kristin! I'm a big fan of Richard Avedon and I loved his American West Series and Cindy Sherman sounds right up my alley! Thanks for visiting!

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